Presidents
Thomas Jefferson
1743-1826

Thomas Jefferson, America's third president and leading political thinker, was born at Shadwell in Albemarle County, Virginia. He graduated from the College of William and Mary, studied law and administered a landed estate inherited from his father.

He was elected to the House of Burgesses, the Virginia legislature, in 1769 and established his reputation as a writer on political issues and not as an orator. In 1772, he married Martha Skelton, who had significant land holdings of her own. His wife bore six children in 10 years, but only two survived infancy. Jefferson never remarried after his wife's death in 1782.

Jefferson drafted instructions for the Virginia delegates at the First Continental Congress and served himself at the Second Continental Congress. In the latter capacity, he is best known for his authorship of the Declaration of Independence.

During much of the early part of the War for Independence, Jefferson served the Virginia legislature and later as governor (1779-81). He was unfairly castigated for fleeing in the face of a British advance while governor and would be charged with cowardice in later political campaigns.

Jefferson again served in the local legislature and in the Congress. In 1784, he was sent to France as America's diplomatic representative, not returning home until the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789 and missing the Constitutional Convention. Jefferson had initially been supportive of the changes in France, but later was repulsed by the bloodshed.

In 1789, Jefferson became the United States' first secretary of state. During the Washington administration he became the focal point of the Democratic-Republican forces, which contended for influence with the Federalists under Alexander Hamilton. In 1796 Jefferson became vice-president in the John Adams administration.

The results of the Election of 1800 pointedly illustrated a serious constitutional defect. Both Jefferson and Aaron Burr won identical numbers of electoral votes, necessitating action by the House of Representatives to decide the election. Bitter debate eventually gave way to Jefferson's selection. He was reelected in 1804. Major events during his administrations included the War with Tripoli, the Louisiana Purchase, the Lewis and Clark expedition, the Burr Conspiracy and the Embargo of 1807.

Jefferson devoted much of his retirement to the establishment of the University of Virginia, tending his estate as the "Sage of Monticello," and corresponding with his former bitter political rival, John Adams. In one of the great ironies in American history, Jefferson and Adams died on the same day, July 4, 1826-fifty years to the day after the approval of the Declaration of Independence.

There was much to admire in Jefferson, clearly the greatest intellect to occupy the presidency. He was a lifelong seeker of knowledge, a musician, an accomplished writer and philosopher, a student of several languages and a naturalist. Jefferson pursued scientific studies, some of which resulted in practical benefits; he was the inventor of the swivel chair and the dumbwaiter. He developed plans for public school reform and instituted land reform in Virginia. Jefferson also worked to establish religious toleration and freedom by eliminating the tax support of the Anglican Church in his home state.

There was, however, a less appealing side to Jefferson's character. He clearly understood that slavery was morally indefensible, but continued to own slaves himself. He was accused during his lifetime of fathering a child with his slave, Sally Hemings, a controversy that remains alive today. In foreign affairs, he was an unbending foe of Britain when prudence would have dictated a more balanced approach. His view of an agrarian democracy was naïve in his own day and was soon eclipsed.

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